


Dragon-Riding in the Pacific Northwest

by ArachneJericho



Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, Original Work - Legend Killer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-29
Updated: 2014-05-29
Packaged: 2018-01-27 00:35:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1708427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArachneJericho/pseuds/ArachneJericho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first thing that S-6743 notices when she actualizes at the edge of the vicinity zone are the tracks, impressed from moss, climbing hillsides amongst trees and fog like the life-long handiwork of a gardener with a very specific fixation. This is not entirely unexpected in the Pacific Northwest rainforest where these abandoned rails lie.</p><p>According to the Academy, they are haunted by a legend—monsters from the other side that need to be killed.</p><p>She is here to kill it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dragon-Riding in the Pacific Northwest

The first thing that S-6743 notices when she actualizes at the edge of the vicinity zone are the tracks, impressed from moss, climbing hillsides amongst trees and fog like the life-long handiwork of a gardener with a very specific fixation. This is not entirely unexpected in the Pacific Northwest rainforest where these abandoned rails lie.

According to the Academy, they are haunted by a legend—monsters from the other side that need to be killed.

She is here to kill it.

S-6743 places one hand to a brown ear, listens to the whirr of insects, waits patiently for a disturbance in the leylines of reality. The world smells to her of damp, green life, accented strongly with pine.

Atel stands tall next to her, hands in the pockets of a business suit ill-suited for this environ. No one outside of S-6743’s head sees her. Atel has been with her since her first set of survival lessons at seven years’ age, and in the next ten S-6743 has never seen the point of telling the Academy about her. Either they know, in which case Atel is a mental plant and not to be entirely trusted; or they didn’t know, and Atel is a defect they would take away.

"Supi," says Atel in her deep yet soft voice, taupe eyes distant. "It’s coming."

Supi—S-6743—quickly tumbles through the bracken, farther away from the rails. Under Atel’s bad influence, she is sure, she thinks of herself as “Supi,” that strange designation never bestowed by her Academy handlers.

The dragon streams into being only twenty feet away, head low to the ground, jagged-toothed mouth open in fixed, deadly smile. Its train-like form still bound to the rails, the long body runs past, bottle green scales reflective even in the hazy light. A hiss crescendoing to a roar fills the air.

Atel stands far too close to the tracks, and ripples as the train’s front claws ram through her; reality distortions have that effect on Supi’s companion. Supi springs, the train’s aura of corrosion already eating away at her bonded bodysuit, revealing brown skin mottled with silver. Atel is already kneeling atop the train as Supi lands on its muscled back.

The dragon train accelerates, and Supi digs metal-tipped fingers into its flesh. Her blood now rebuilds her fingers and suit as quickly as the dragon’s aura degrades them. She leans over the side, looking for a way in; but the dragon’s windows have vanished, a sign of its imminent release from the track, to be followed by terrorization of the few true humans left in the area, like the Kirkland case. No true human survived there, souls devoured; Supi arrived too late.

That will not happen again.

Supi pulls her spirit gun from its arm holster and fires a glowing charge that curves and hits the wall of flesh. The hide explodes in pink gore and tattered skin; Supi flips downwards between two ruined ribs. She tumbles to the spongy pink floor, the sour stench of stomach acid crawling up her nose.

Then the dragon seals its side, leaving her in a darkness reminiscent of anti-anxiety training exercises that entirely failed to extinguish her clawing nyctophobia. She would have been eliminated by the Academy were it not for Atel—who is once more by her side. A hand that should have been insubstantial steadies Supi by the shoulder. Courage returns to her, and the spirit gun recharges with a tling.

Supi runs down the length of the dragon, towards the head. The floor buckles as its body strains against the rails. She finds the heart filling the space where the fuel car would have been for a real train, can see through its translucent walls its near-emptiness.

She aims her gun at its pulsating form.

Atel’s hand grabs the muzzle and shoves it downwards.

Supi glares at Atel, angry righteousness evident upon her face. Atel remains cool, but her eyes show her pain.

"It’s a feeling creature," she says. "Even if you care nothing for yourself, do you not feel for this myth?"

That topic has come up before, but never has Supi let it stop her. She tries to drag the gun from Atel’s “grasp,” but the hallucination is oddly persistent in its corporality.

"Locked to the rails all its existence, with only a conductor to soothe it; now that nameless one is gone. Do you think it deserves to die for that?"

"People are in danger," replies Supi, but her words feel empty, repeating the Academy’s mission statement. "Destruction is the quickest way to solve this problem."

"Find another fuel source. Feed this train’s hunger. For once, let all involved live. Remember Huntington.”

Supi curses. Those children, who had only looked like children. She burned them alive in front of their guardians’ eyes because only fire would destroy them, and because the Academy sent the kill order. Her own observations hadn’t mattered in the end.

The dragon screams. Supi barely resists covering her ears with her hands, as that would mean dropping the gun. Atel must be gaining strength, twisting her mind, a test of will or an enemy agent. The screaming in Huntington seems like it will never stop.

Realization dawns on her. She looks at her gun, its casing glowing with her courage. Her power.

Atel, knowing her intent, releases the muzzle.

Supi rips open the heart, and drops in the spirit gun. A sparking chemical reaction, like grains of pure sodium dropped into water, then a blinding light that fills the cabin and drives her back, vaporizing darkness.

The train lurches, then steadies. The roar drops into a becalmed susurration that shivers the walls, now lit with bioluminescence.

The screaming—from outside, from inside—stops.

If Supi were to leave, she knows, her power would depart from it. She feels a fear of the future, stuck on this train, a new conductor for an age-old monster, going directly against the Academy’s purpose.

Atel offers a hand. Hesitantly, then bravely, Supi takes it. And knows in that moment what Atel is; but that no longer matters.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a little experimental piece I wrote. People tell me it’s so jam-packed with story it should be extended, but I’m not sure I have the heart for it. 
> 
> It reached the second round of consideration for Daily Science Fiction but ultimately failed the final round. I have not since submitted anywhere, and I realize now that it’s partly because I don’t feel like it reflects me well as a writer. There’s something about it that doesn’t sit right with me. 
> 
> Anyways, let me know if you find it interesting enough to want more of it (an expanded version of the tale, or more about this universe, etc).


End file.
